The production of containers from glass tubing, involving ampules or similar glass products, conssits of two successive manufacturing steps which in turn include several operations.
The first manufacturing step involves the production of container blanks from glass tubing which are drawn, formed and cut directly from glass tubing by a known method and then delivered to the second manufacturing step.
Particularly with the production of ampules, the second manufacturing step includes extensive operations which, depending on the type of ampule, may be widely varying and expensive. The invention deals with this manufacturing step based on container blanks of glass tubing as semifinished products.
In ampule manufacture, it is known in the art how to deliver the container blanks, coming from a production machine, to an intermittently operating conveying device which facilitates further conveyance along a conveying route and hence to successive processing stations along this conveying route. The devices for realizing this second manufacturing step involve outright processing lines which in similar form are known also in other areas of industrial production.
Typical of such processing lines for processing blanks from glass tubing are intake rails having recesses and intermittently movable lifting cams (also chain conveyers and similar means) which with each operation lift a certain number of ampule blanks from the recesses receiving them on the intake rails, move them by one or several indexing steps between adjacent recesses in the conveying direction and the deposit them for further processing. The ampule blanks are thus received loosely lying in the recesses of the intake rails.
It has been found that because of the stepwise delivery of blanks from one such recess in the intake rail to successive recesses, undesirable skid marks may appear on the outer surfaces of the glass products. The appearance of such skid marks is increased by the fact that during various processes the blanks received in the horizontal position must be set in rotation about their lengthwise axes for which purpose at such processing stations friction wheels must act from the outside on the ampule jacket. For example, when separating the ampule head, it is necessary to set the blanks in rotation about their horizontal lengthwise axes.
It is an object of the present invention to improve the known production method by avoiding the previously unavoidable markings and skid marks on the jacket surfaces.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an arrangement of the foregoing character which is substantially simple in construction and may be economically fabricated.
A further object of the present invention is to provide an installation, as described, which may be readily maintained in service and which has a substantially long operating life.